Tag Archives: creativi

In 2005 the municipality of Verona was doing consultation on its strategic plan, and the young Veronese were not buying. They thought the administration (four years into its term) was simply not credible: “we are forever stuck in the first meeting”, as a young man told a senior officer to his face and in public (I was there). In this context, I was asked to help the city’s culture-related nonprofits to get together and deliver an event that was to symbolize the municipality’s new commitment to treating youngsters as partners. They were willing to invest a small sum, 30K euro.

Cultural operators in Italian small and medium sized towns almost invariably hate each other. Makes sense: their environment is one of zero-sum competition for funding, allocated with criteria that are not always transparent. Every cent I get is a cent you won’t get. This creates a climate of mistrust. Involving an outsider like me was to be a sign that in this case things would be done differently: this small additional fund was conditional to the creatives being able to design and deliver a common project.

This was my first true community fostering and management. I created a mailing list (hey, we had no cool web 2.0 stuff back then) and demanded everybody used it to communicate, no private emails; bullied the municipality’s stuff into sitting in meetings that started at 7 p.m., so that the creatives could attend without conflicts with their day jobs); and even talked the two main city officials into going to the local winery after each meeting with the creatives. I discovered the power of transparency and informality: the most important progress was almost always made in the winery, not at meetings. In the end the event did happen: it reclaimed derelict spaces like the former zoo; embodied a more free, creative idea of Verona, with the Africal fashion catwalk shows, the writers contests and the mythical dance bus you see in the video. They called it VRBAN, and it was a roaring success. Many people who participated in the process discovered in each other competent colleagues worthy of respect, with whom collaboration could be a pleasure.

Recently I went back to Verona for a concert and –surprise – VRBAN is still there, and it has become the main event of the Verona summer, with thousands of participants. It is now in its sixth year; is entirely funded by private investors and own revenue (the new center-right administration does, however, supply some services); is run by some of the kids of 2005, that meanwhile have become professionals of cultural event organization (Alessandro and Fabio) and communication (Ale); has even generated a spinoff, the Italian network of ecologically sustainable music festivals. It is a piece of the city’s economy and culture. I am so proud of it! Of course, they were the ones who did it. But the city’s authority did its part, and I think I helped.

So, if you go to Verona in July, go to VRBAN, ask for Alessandro Formenti, Fabio Fila or Ale Biti and ask them to give you their stories. And drink one to my health. 🙂

Economists are commonly deemed to be more prone to abstract reasoning than to concrete action. There must be a grain of truth in this, because it is quite common to hear economists jokes in Economics Departments. This one, for example:

After a shipwreck, an economist ends up stranded on a desert island. He looks around and sees a wooden box, washed upon the shore by the waves. He opens it: it is full of canned food, nutritious and long-lasting! However, he does not have any tools to open the cans: is he doomed to starve amidst abundance? The economist does not lose his cool, and he tackles the problem the way his profession tas taught to to: “Assume I have a can-opener…”

Many of us yearn for concreteness. This is why I am so happy to fly to Potenza on Friday 4th: in May 2007 the Ministry of Economic Development asked me to help the Basilicata regional administration in designing a policy to build creative spaces, and now the first space (called Cecilia) is here, and the other four will follow in a matter of months. Not only have they been designed chiefly by the local creatives that are going to use them; they also come with clear guidelines for being turned over to private sector– and third sector entities or running them, which the competent local authorities have signed off to; and are integrated with a pretty advanced governance model of the Region’s cultural policy.

The project is called Visioni Urbane. I have dealt with it before. I’m told it’s becoming some sort of flagship project for the regional adiministration; the “Visioni Urbane method” is being demanded on tackling other policies (for example setting up a regional Film Commission), and the administration itself is building upon the partnership with the creatives created within Visioni Urbane to launch Matera’s bid for European Culture Capital 2019. It is no coincidence that the person in charge of Visioni Urbane, Rossella Tarantino, has been appointed as coordinator of that bid; and another Visioni veteran, Paolo Verri, is serving as scientific director.

My book Wikicrazia contains a lot of Visioni Urbane war stories, and the grandopening of Cecilia will include a book presentation. But what I’m really looking forward to is the joy of witnessing a policy that I helped to develop go live, live and so concrete that I can actually sit and listen to a concert in it. For an economist, this is a thrill, alas, all too rare.